The present invention relates to an article attaching device for attaching an article to a basic member or member, wherein the article attaching device is first attached to the member and then the article is attached to the member by inserting a hook fixed to the article from an open upper surface of a box portion of the article attaching device to engage engaging portions of the article attaching device.
In a prior art, an article attaching device inserted into an attaching hole of a base member or member, such as an under panel of an automobile, is attached to the member by holding the under panel between a flange and attaching pawl portions provided to an outer circumference of a box portion of the article attaching device, and engaging portions engaging a hook inserted from an open upper surface of the box portion are provided to opposed inner sides of the box portion.
Therefore, the article attaching device is attached to the under panel, and the hook fixed to a rear seat is inserted from the open upper surface of the article attaching device to be engaged with the engaging portions. Thus, the rear seat can be attached to the under panel. Incidentally, the article attaching device as described above is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication (KOKAI) No. 8-35509.
In the conventional article attaching device, the engaging portions are provided on the opposed inner sides of the box portion so that the respective engaging portions overlap in the same area in a horizontal direction parallel to the opposed inner sides. Also, inclined surfaces for guiding the hook are provided at the opposed upper portions of the engaging portions so that a space between the opposed engaging portions is gradually reduced from an upper side toward a lower side to thereby decrease a force for inserting the hook between the opposed engaging portions.
However, in case the hook is inserted between the engaging portions, since the space between the engaging portions has to be widened uniformly so that the hook can pass therethrough, if the engaging portions face each other in the same area in the horizontal direction, large force is required. For example, the insertion force for inserting the hook between the engaging portions is 226 Newton (hereinafter referred to as "N") and an extracting force for extracting the hook between the engaging portions is 276N, the difference between the two forces being extremely small. Since the large inserting force of 226N is required, workability of the article attaching device is bad.
The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and an object of the invention is to provide an article attaching device, wherein an article can be easily engaged with the article attaching device.
Another object of the invention is to provide an article attaching device as stated above, wherein while an extracting force for extracting the article from the article attaching device is large sufficient to keep engagement of the article with article attaching device, a difference between the extracting force and an insertion force for inserting the article to the article attaching device is large.
A further object of the invention is to provide an article attaching device as stated above, wherein the article attaching device has good workability.
Further objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description of the invention.